Free All Shook Up by Josey Alden Page B

say.
    "What if seeing all this makes him want to party again? What if we're responsible for him relapsing? That would suck on a level I can't even contemplate."
    I laugh. "If anything, I'm pretty sure our little show reinforced his decision to go clean."
    We take the back way to my bedroom to avoid bumping into Mark and Mary. As my remaining guests wake up and realize they are in the middle of an open house with the lead guitarist of Never More Alone, they pile into the bathroom with Lisa and me.
    "Why didn't you say anything about Mark Dillon looking at the house?" Hondo says. He sheds his clothes without a shred of modesty and steps into the shower. "You bruised me, by the way."
    "Try sleeping somewhere other than the floor, then, my delicate flower," I say.
    The truth is, no matter where we crash each night, Hondo and I always sleep within ten feet of each other. He is my safety, my soulmate, my platonic better half. The one thing that we can both count on is coming home to each other. As soon as this albatross of a house sells, though, we have no idea where "home" will be.
    Lisa sits on the counter to get a better look at her face in the mirror. She's a small-time model, mostly catalogs, and she spends half her time in front of a mirror or camera.
    "Look at this," she says. "Look at this! I have a shoot tomorrow. What the hell am I going to do?"
    I look, but I can't see the flaw that she sees. "Lisa, love, that's what make-up is for."
    From her perch on the toilet, Clara groans. "Shut up if you don't want my head to explode."
    "It might be an improvement for you, sweetness," Hondo yells from the shower, the deep bass of his voice thundering off the walls.
    "Fuck you." Clara tries to rip off some toilet paper, but it just keeps rolling. She gets frustrated and pulls half the roll off, throwing most of it on the floor.
    "Hey, we're trying to clean up here," I say. Of course, it's far too late for that.
    Hondo leaves the water running in the shower when he comes out. "Your turn," he says, wrinkling his nose to let me know a shower is not optional.
    Seeing six-foot-five Hondo with that expression always cracks me up. I watch him dry off, starting with his short and spiky bleached hair. Body-wise, he's a cross between soccer and basketball—perfectly proportionate and muscular but with stretched arms and legs, and hands that can practically wrap around your wrist twice. Nature treated him kindly, too, except it doesn't matter much to him. Hondo is asexual. In high school, he dated a few girls. In college, he dated a few guys. He finally realized that no one really does it for him, and now, he's content just being Hondo. Our running joke is that he has the longest, loneliest schlong in the south.
    "Find me some clean clothes?" I say to Hondo as I strip and get into the steaming shower.
    "Yes, dear."
    "Kisses."
    The hot water massages me from neck to toe, thanks to a complicated shower contraption that Mary says is a "luxury feature" of the house. I wonder if apartments have these kinds of features? Or tents?
    The shower helps me feel half-human again. I wish I could live my life in this shower, where the only thing I would have to do is wash away the dirt day after day.  
    I have to use Hondo's damp, chilly towel because the rest of the towels are wadded up in the laundry room, probably growing a large population of mutant mold people.
    I put the towel over the shower door for the next person and pull on the wrinkled dress Hondo left on the hook next to the shower. I'm sure he had to dig deep to find this one clean item of clothing. I decide not to complain about having to wear a mini-dress, circa 1982.
    In my closet, I jam my bare feet into a pair of silver tennies, and then finally look at myself in the mirror. Not quite as frightening as I thought. The day-old eyeliner is gone, and my cheeks actually have some color to them. My skin stays pale nine months out of the year and slightly tinted during the summer. I must be the